StanChart South Korea workers plan to go on strike

Employees demand that the lender should cease adoption of an incentive-based salary system, which is seen to cut salaries by as much as 46%

Workers at Standard Chartered Plc (STAN)’s South Korean banking unit plan to strike from June 27 to protest the company’s plan to change its salary system, leaving the bank with about half its workforce.

About 3,000 union members at Standard Chartered First Bank Korea Ltd. plan to walk off the job “indefinitely,” Bae Kwang Jin, a spokesman for the workers’ union, said by phone on Friday. The unit’s total workforce was about 6,500 as of March 31, according to the lender’s regulatory filing.

London-based Standard Chartered operates five affiliates in South Korea under holding company Standard Chartered Korea Ltd., which was formed after the U.K. lender purchased Korea First Bank for $3.3 billion in 2005. The bank will continue resolution talks with the union and a strike decision is “regrettable,” Standard Chartered First Bank said in an e-mailed statement.

View the full story in Bloomberg.